• Wit,  Writing

    Wednesday Words: construction therapy

    …and Steve’s worst idea ever. Stay tuned!

    Want to expose every crack and weakness in your relationship all at once?

    Remodel your house.

    What started as an I’ve got this – boldly proclaimed from my mouth – quickly became a slow descent into I AM TRIGGERED.

    And I don’t use that term lightly because that’s a giant pet peeve of mine. People should be able to freely and genuinely say that their body, their emotions, and their past are all colliding at once.

    It’s very messy.

    Between tradespeople looking at me like I had two heads, insisting I had plumbing work done that I did not have done, calling me a liar, aggressively asking for money, to me throwing them out of my house – I was over it after 3 weeks of this all day, every day.

    Oh and my favorite, being asked a question, giving an answer, and them texting Steve, IN FRONT OF ME – thousands of miles away – because they didn’t like my answer.

    I’m three feet away from you and I know what I want. I also do what I want in case you’re wondering.

    We finally got most of the work done and fired the original contractor. But that didn’t fix my mental fatigue over having people in my home for three weeks treating me like an idiot.

    Oh, and I’ve failed to mention – we started all of this the day of opening night of Chaney’s two week run of Elf the Musical.

    All the jazz hands. And other hand gestures.

    We remodeled the two guest baths, all the floors, the kitchen, the fireplace and the only room we left untouched was the master bath because we have bigger plans that we want to do right the first time.

    Enter Steve’s worst idea ever.

    One night we were laying in bed commiserating over the layer of dust that now functioned as powdered foundation for me when Steve wondered aloud, “what if we took the wall and door down that separate the toilet from the rest of the bathroom?”.

    Me: So you want to turn our bathroom into a prison bathroom??

    I’ll get right on putting a drain in the middle of the floor tomorrow. Easiest remodel ever. 

    We got a good laugh out of it and despite everything, we are thrilled with the results of both the remodel and the improvement in our ability to communicate. We also laugh a lot about all 5′ of me standing on the landing of the stairs to throw the tile crew out of our house – hey, higher ground is needed when you’re short.

    And now that’s being remodeled to add a podium for me to stand and regularly address the family.

    Everyone wins.

    Painting the rest of the house happens on December 16th and then we are done for awhile.

    But Steve is still getting soap-on-a-rope for Christmas.

     

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